Manufacturers and agencies associated with the lighting industry have developed standard lamp bases (incorporated into the lamp assembly itself) and corresponding lamp holders. The basis for these related art bases and holders is to provide the market with standardized products for facilitating a competitive environment where multiple lamp manufacturers and lamp fixture manufacturers could develop and sell interchangeable components that met the basic needs of the lighting market. Standard lamp base standards, including, but not limited to, T5, T8, Tb, T12, 2G7, 2G11, G23 and GX23, as designated for lamps manufactured by Philips Lighting™ and others, may have been developed as common standards to facilitate the implementation of lamps into various applications. Manufacturers have developed many different lamp models based on these standard lamp bases.
In many applications, the lamp base standards serve the industry well. However, in certain applications, utilization of the standard lamp base configurations can be detrimental. Typically, different model lamps manufactured on one particular lamp base standard vary greatly in terms of lamp voltage, current, illumination and power rating. This condition may present problems with respect to proper and safe usage of lamps with certain lamp fixtures. “Blind” utilization of the standard lamp bases by manufacturers within lamp fixtures creates a situation where the lay person consumer or user may easily, potentially, and unknowingly, implement the wrong lamp type for the device employed. Sometimes lamp models with different power and current ratings utilize the same apparent configuration, e.g. Philips Lighting™ Model Nos. TUV36WPLL and TUV60WPLL, which only serves to increase the probability of an incorrect lamp implementation by the user.
Another problem in the related art lamp devices may be in their performance. Lamp power is often critical to the performance of the system employing the lamp. For instance, where lamps are used for non-illumination purposes, including germicidal applications, the effective dosage of the system may be predominately affected by the power of the lamp being utilized. Utilization of the incorrect lamp in such systems results in failure of the system to achieve critical dosing, which may be required and/or specified. This may result in the device failing to meet the specified performance.
Yet other problems in the related art are unreliability and liability. The reliability of the device employed can be adversely affected by the implementation of the incorrect lamp. Impedance differences associated with different lamp models can induce problems with an employed system. Reliability and liability issues surrounding misapplication of lamps may include implementation of an incorrect lamp which causes premature lamp failure, thereby resulting in loss of performance and breach of warranty. Furthermore, implementation of an incorrect lamp may cause premature ballast (power supply) and controller failure, thereby also resulting in loss of performance and breach of warranty. Implementation of an incorrect lamp can cause operation of a device to go outside of acceptable thermal and electrical limits. This condition can result in loss of performance, breach of warranty, and personal injury liability. Also, as discussed in the preceding sections, the implementation of an incorrect lamp resulting in diminished dosage performance may result in injury, especially in germicidal applications, and personal injury liability claims by the consumer.
Yet another problem in the current art is related to marketing. In many cases, an advantage to the manufacturer and provider of equipment exists in requiring replacement parts to be distributed through their own channels of distribution. With a standard lamp base and fixture, replacement lamps may come from any source; and the channels of distribution and sales cannot be assured.
Some manufacturers may have made, or deferred to, the decision to offer products that rely primarily on the knowledge of the user and the utilization of the standard lamp bases to ensure the proper continued operation of their systems in application. This strategy may result in a potential misapplication of their systems, although it may provide a lowest cost approach for the initial device sale and also in lamp replacement sales.
Yet another problem can occur which creates a safety issue. Fluorescent lamps for illumination are currently manufactured and sold with the same lamp configuration and base as germicidal lamps. Due to increased sales of UV germicidal fixtures for treating air in commercial and residential HVAC systems, UV germicidal lamps are sold through marketing channels available to consumers. An unknowing consumer could actually buy a germicidal lamp from a retail store and place it in the receptacle of a normal fluorescent illumination lamp fixture, thereby creating a dangerous situation. Fluorescent illumination fixtures do have the safeguards and carry the warnings associated with UV fixtures. Of utmost concern, UV lamps can be harmful to the skin and the eyes. What is needed is a system that may address these and other problems associated with lamp fixtures and assemblies.